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5/30/12

If you didn't read Part 1 of this blog, click here (otherwise this one may make very little sense). Unlike many of my blogs this one is a little more 'to the point' and a little less 'fluffy writing' so please forgive me if you feel like you've been called into a conference room to be debreifed!

I'm a planner. I have cheklists, agendas, reminders, and multiple calenders that help me keep track of my day to day life. I'm a planner. Life, however, isn't always as considerate as a planner would like…and so begins this post.

Déjà vu anyone?

The only way I even know how to begin this blog is to thank you all for your fervent prayers over our little family and constant and uplifting support through all of the insanity the last couple of months!

So as you know (or now know since you've caught up with part one, right?), Our plans were taking us to Florida to pursue a lead in the Fort Myers area, since it was the most promising to date. As I'm sure you've guessed-plans have changed. Again.

Timeline: 6 Months ago Justin and I stumbled upon a Christian boarding school in Longview, Texas called "Heartlight Ministries" and absolutely fell in love with their facilities. We sat drooling over our keyboards as we dug deeper and deeper into their website, their mission statement, their goals, and the overall approach of their ministry. A résumé was out the next day, with high hopes of getting a callback. Simply (and quickly) said, they absolutely loved Justin but had no room to hire another counselor onto their staff. So with frowny-faces we moved on and continued our search, trusting that the Lord had a job for us and that His faithfulness would not come up short.

Timeline:3 Weeks ago I posted Part 1 of this blog (The 'We're moving to Florida' announcenent)

Timeline: 1.5 Weeks ago Heartlight emailed Justin personally with a job opening, and before we even had time to discuss and respond they called his cell to inform him (enthusiastically) that they'd love for him to come out for another interview. As you can imagine we were initially flooded with the "seriously…now…?" feeling. But as we learned more and more about the job, the benefits, the hours and the sallary, it slowly morphed from an untimely blessing into an absolute answer to prayer.

Timeline: Tuesday May 29th Justin was flown out to Longview, Texas to visit Heartlight Ministries again and have an interview early Wednesday Morning.

Timeline: Wednesday May, 30th Justin was offered a Full-time counseling position with Heartlight Ministries. He'll be on sallary-from his first day-we'll receive medical, vision, and dental insurance, He'll have a 401k so we can begin putting away for our retirement, as well as additional perks that come along with this position.

Justin and I sat down to decide (prior to his second interview) whether or not we wanted this job-that way he could either chose to simply forfeit the second interview, or accept on the spot if they were to offer it to him. Objectively there was no question, the job in Florida was only part-time (and only after 6 months of interning) and had no benefits-but of course we'd be close to family. It was an incredibly emotional decision, speficically for me, but after a lot of prayer, pros/cons lists, and discussion, we landed upon the decision that this job would be the absolute best choice for us.

To say the least (as I'm trying to get this out to you all ASAP since Florida is 3 hours ahead of us right now) we are absolutely ecstatic and so incredibly grateful for the Lord's provision. We're reminded again the value of Faith and trusting that God's timing and will are not always that of our own, but are so beautifully placed regardless of our own agendas.

I'm planning on writing another post (part 3) taking you on a bit more indepth trip through our spiritual journey in all of this and share with you the things the Lord has graciously taught me in this whole ordeal! Thank you so much for being patient! (and thank you in advance for ignorning the undoubltably overwhelming amount of gramatical and spelling errors in this blog, as I'm getting this out just moments before dinner and not even stopping to proof!!)

Here is the link to the website for Heartlight Ministries, hopefully you can take a moment to visit and be as blessed by it as we have been: Heartlight Ministries

5/22/12

5/6/12

I'm a planner. I have cheklists, agendas, reminders, and multiple calenders that help me keep track of my day to day life. I'm a planner. Life, however, isn't always as considerate as a planner would like…and so begins this post.

New years eve we rang in 2012 with champagne and stamps; printing resumes, refining cover letters, stuffing and sealing document envelopes and preparing for the next chapter to come. Justin and I, as a couple, desire the Lord's leading so deeply and prayed consistantly for not only open doors, but closed doors as well. In the months following the "resume sendout" the subtle sound of clicking latches filled the air as we saw doors gently closing from each coast and began to see doors open where we currently are. After hours of discussion and prayer we decided, months ago, that we'd be staying in Fort worth.

The last week of April rolls around and we're living within the usual 'tenative stability' that any student does. I was working full-time as a nanny for a family here in fort worth, and Justin was going to school full-time and counseling part-time with a promising lead outside of town for after graduation. We were two weeks away from Graduation, we had a plan, and we were content.

In the same week the promising job lead for Justin fell through, and the application for the apartment we were planning on moving into was denied. Days later due to a severely nonnegotialble moral issue, I had to very unnexpectedly quit my job. Because of the specific circumstances an additional two weeks was not an option as it would continue to keep me in, to say the least, an unfortunate situation. So suddenly we were left unemployed, three weeks away from our deadline to move out, and with no promising leads anywhere for either of us. As we rubbed our noses trying to dull the sting of a door slamming directly in our face, the worry was heavy and discouragement was even heavier.

To make an incredibly long and detailed story short(er), God is so good. By His grace Justin and I were able to put our heads together and come up with a plan…we didn't know where we were going, but we knew we were going somewhere, and we know in order to be lead by the Lord, we had to start walking.

On Paul, Silas, and Timothy's journey in Acts they set out together to go preach the gospel of Jesus and were guided along as they went. A lot of the time when I remember this story I visualize a game of pong…A consistantly moving ball that is blocked and bounced in a different direction over and over again. After being kept by the Spirit from preaching the gospel in Asia the three came up to Mysia and attmepted to go into Bithynia, but again the Holy Spirit denied them. So they passed by and went down to Troas when Paul received the Macedonian call which lead to the realization that God had called them to preach the gospel in Macedonia. There is such a valuble lesson to be learned here! These three didn't just sit, passionately twiddling their thumbs and waiting for a deep booming voice to tell them they were to go to Macedonia-they went! They began walking and seizing each opportunity and were not discouraged when the Lord's hand softly came down to turn them around-like a ball bouncing across the screen one way until guided another.

Justin and I knew we needed to start walking in order for doors to close and to be 'bounced' in another direction…so we began packing, with no plan-only a stack of cardboard boxes, and Faith.

By God's sweet, sweet, provision a door has opened in Southwest Florida near where I grew up with a time constraint that will allow us a month between graduation and his first day there. The new plan is that Justin and I will be flying out to southern California on Monday May, 14th to visit family and friends and simply unwind for almost an entire month. After this we will come back to Fort worth to gather our things from a storage unit, load them into a moving truck, and head down to Southwest Florida.

We're so grateful for all of your prayers and want to assure our close friends that we haven't been keeping anyone in the dark-all these changes are as sudden to us as they are to you! They were not, however, sudden to God and we're praising the Lord every day for a Savior who is never surprised.